


On The Sidelines

by Radella_Hardwick



Series: Yearnings [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Gen, Introspection, Unrequited Crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-21
Updated: 2017-04-21
Packaged: 2018-10-22 09:02:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10693770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Radella_Hardwick/pseuds/Radella_Hardwick
Summary: The day after her birthday, a young woman sits at a dance, wishing for a partner who isn't there





	On The Sidelines

She sat there yearning for something absurdly simple but unobtainable: she wanted to be held in the arms of a man she barely knew and swung. Not just any male acquaintance – there were several of those, some of whom she found attractive – but a specific man, a man who tops her by roughly a foot. A man with strong arms and a firm grasp. A man for whom she has a sprouting passion. A man who is absent.

 

There were other men there, even other men she found attractive, but suddenly this overwhelming desire to be in his and swinging had surged within her. He was the reason she was there; she hadn't intended to come, hadn't expected to be able to come. But, then, she had been told she had 44 hours off and her more proximate dishes hadn't responded to her offer of contact, so she had changed her plans and come to the dance in the hopes of seeing and dancing with and talking to him. But he wasn't there. He was probably off celebrating. With his actual friends. She wanted to say ‘his other friends’ but she knew better than that. She and he weren't properly friends, much as she might want it. They were acquaintances, who enjoyed each other's conversation and danced OK together. For all she knew, he didn't think of her at all, when they weren't face to face. While she thrilled every time his name appeared in her Facebook feed, his eyes might pass over hers like hers so over the serpents she met at university.

  
She's saved not by a true friend – one of those who would recognise her physical pain, if not her disappointment – but by the end of the dance she was missing to rest her leg and her determination not to pine. She has no right to his time or attention and she enjoys the dancing for its own sake, regardless of who she's dancing with. She sheds the desire, if not the tranquil melancholy, as she gets to her feet to indicate her willingness to dance. She dances the next two and then there's a break. She's too subdued to approach anyone but she chats, normally, to those next to her and one of the guys she finds attractive, so comes and sits next to her. The desire does not re-occur.


End file.
